Monthly Archives: February 2015

Hall Of Fame – Yuriy Borzakovskiy

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yuriy borzakovskiy

I admit – this wasn’t my original intention. For my next Hall Of Fame induction I was planning to introduce an athlete in a sport which is not track & field – because despite the evidence for the contrary, this is not a track & field Hall Of Fame. It embraces all sports without considering their race, age, religion, sexual orientation, etc. But Borzakovskiy just recently announced his retirement from the world of sports, and I decided to make a change of plans. Yuriy was one of my all-time favorite track & field athletes, and his place in the Hall Of Fame was guaranteed, but I used this opportunity to honor him and induct him now instead of sometime later.

So… Yuriy Borzakovskiy! One of the greatest 800m runners of the past 15 years. Never a world record holder or a world champion, but he has been an Olympic champion, a four time medalist in the Athletics World Championships, a European champion, a mainstay in the discipline’s elite for the past 15 years, but perhaps more than anything – like Kajsa Bergqvist, he possessed a style which probably made him a favorite of the neutral sports fans. Continue reading →

NBA All Star 2015 – Part II

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Ok, so despite my disappointment with this year’s all-star game, it still supplied us with some nice numbers. In this part I’ll try to put my bitterness aside, in order to return to the previews I wrote before the game about the leaders (you can see part I and part II here). I’ll go over each category in turn. Let’s start with…

Games Played

Mirror mirror on the wall, which category was the most predictable of them all? This was! It’s like the Academy Awards category for “Best Actress” in 2011, when Natalie Portman was nominated for “Black Swan” (one of my all-time favorite movies, BTW. One of the 14-movies in my top 10). Timmy climbed to second place all-time, with 15 games, and there’s really nothing interesting to say about it apart from that. Continue reading →

NBA All Star 2015 – Part I

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The All-Star weekend is behind us. It’s weird, I waited a year for this event, and now that it’s over I cannot feel not-disappointed. What is felt cannot be unfelt! Many of the events were really disappointing, although definitely not all of them. In the first part of my all-star summary, I will look back at what we had. In the second part I want to look at how I fared with my reviews and predictions of the leaders in the various statistical categories. I don’t want to mix the stats stuff with the non-stats stuff. Damn, saying that last sentence aloud is really difficult, at least for me it was. All those s’s… try it yourself!

Rookies and Sophomores Game

Or, as they like to call it officially: “Rising Stars Challenge”. Jesus, doesn’t “rookies and sophomores” sounds more intuitive? Anyway, I don’t watch this event every year on a regular basis, just from time to time, when there are some interesting rookies that I look forward to watch in action. I believe the first time I watched this game was in 2004, when LeBron, Carmelo and Wade lost to Amar’e Stoudemire. Yes, it was a 3-on-1 game. Continue reading →

NBA All Star Watch – Part II

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Well, it’s time for part II of our holiday special (and here’s a link to Part I). The concept for part II is the same simple one that was in part I – let’s have a look at the leaders (top 5) in the various statistical categories in the history of the all-star game, and see which current players might have a chance to move up the rankings, and even break the record one day.

Any further introduction is redundant. Let’s get down to business!

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NBA All Star Watch – Part I

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Ho ho ho,  we’re nearing the NBA all-star game, and it’s a great opportunity to have a look at the records book in order to keep a close watch on the players who can make a splash in this year’s game and who might move ahead in the all-time leaders lists in the various categories.

Several years ago, I compiled an Excel file with stats about all the players who ever took part in the all star game. While I was at it, I also compiled a list of the leaders in each category. Continue reading →